In the current information age, there are often discussions of the desirableness of a paperless society. However, notwithstanding such discussions, there remains a great need by users of computers and other terminal devices (including tablets and mobile phones) for printing functionality. Therefore, devices having printing functionality, such as printers, copiers, multi-function devices, etc., continue to play a significant role in information technology (IT) at home and at work.
A computer or information terminal typically needs printer driver software in order to communicate properly with a printing device, and a printer driver generally provides a software interface that allows the operating system and software applications running on the computer or other terminal devices to interface functionally with the printing device. For example, the printer driver software may match standardized commands from the computer's operating system to specific capabilities of the printing device.
Printing devices typically provide users with a plurality of print options, such as paper, tray, size, color, etc., which are accessible through user interfaces invoked by applications, and the task of providing such print options is performed by the printer driver software installed on the computer or other terminal devices. For example, conventional printer driver software may include a printer interface DLL (dynamic-link library, i.e. a collection of resources shared by other programs), as shown in FIG. 1A, to provide a user interface through which users can view and edit print options (e.g., configuration parameters of the printer driver).
The set of printing devices and functionalities available to a user can change over time because printing devices can be replaced or updated. In addition, the current trend is that more and more of the computers and other terminals devices which can access the peripherals are mobile. Therefore, the number and functionality of printing devices available to a user can vary depending on the location of the computer or terminal device used by the user at that moment.
As a result, the dynamic nature of modern-day printing environments makes it difficult for a user at a terminal (i.e. PC, tablet, mobile phone, etc.) to have prior knowledge of the printing devices that are available to the user at the moment when the user wishes to print a document.
However, conventional IT systems often do not provide a user-friendly system for a user at a terminal to find the appropriate or desired printer, particularly when the terminal has been moved from its usual location to a new or different location. For example, when a user invokes a print function, the user interface of the conventional system may display a preconfigured list of printers, as shown in FIG. 1B, and the user interface may allow the user to set basic print options. Further, other printer-specific options may be specified after the Properties button on the user interface screen is pressed, in the example shown in FIG. 1B.
However, the list of printers displayed in the print user interface is fixed, regardless of the location of the terminal, and is not dynamically updated to include newly added printers or exclude printers that have been moved elsewhere or removed from the network altogether. Thus, the user must have prior knowledge of the available printers (i.e. that such printers are available to the user, where the printers are located, what kinds of printers they are, and what kinds of settings are available on the printers) before selecting a printer for printing a document. Even with such prior knowledge, the user cannot be sure whether the list of printers displayed in the print user interface is up-to-date at the time of printing (i.e. whether the printers displayed still exist and whether additional printers have become available) because such a list of printers is static, and not maintained dynamically.
An improved approach for dynamically providing print services which allows a user to select an appropriate printer to which a print job can be sent is needed.